quote:Originally posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer: How could you tell? Would the pillar of fire have a black rectangle covering it up and the meteor that hit Sodom be pixelated?
Is this a serious question? If so, I'll give my argumented answer.
posted
I'd go back and watch Humans evolve from microscopic organisms for the sole purpose of ending that other thread.
But seriously, I start by looking up what the US government is hiding in all the "Top Secret" zones like Area51 (not that I believe anything is being hidden there NOW, but maybe when it was first founded).
All the other mainstream stuff, I could just wait till someone else looked it up and wrote about it (hopefully with reference points so I could go back and see the highlights for myself).
Sadly enough, I think that if the technology were ever found to allow something like this, the public would never know about it; at least with the current state of the world. Too many powerful groups would stand to lose too much. From an atheistic point of view, I think religion would take the hardest hit of all, and despite not believing in it myself, I still feel that religion is a good and necessary thing for the majority of people, and plenty of others would share that opinion and prevent the general public from ever knowing about said technology.
About the limits on how far back you could see: There was no limit, but that was kept secret to all but a few. The supposed limit was 100 years.
Posts: 636 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer: How could you tell? Would the pillar of fire have a black rectangle covering it up and the meteor that hit Sodom be pixelated?
Is this a serious question? If so, I'll give my argumented answer.
A.
The "How could you tell?" was serious, the fire and Sodom was a joke.
Posts: 1029 | Registered: Apr 2007
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posted
I thought the Pastwatch machines simply found no evidence of gods appearing to man; e.g., the movie of an alleged divine appearance might show a person talking into the air as though a divine being were there, but not the being itself (it would have existed, if at all, only in the person's mind). So in the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, we'd be able to see meteors coming down and destroying the cities, just as we'd be able to see any other meteor strike, but we wouldn't be able to hear God talking to Lot about it.
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quote:Originally posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer: The "How could you tell?" was serious
Ok, here are my premises: 1) There is a device at the HQ of PastWatch that allows for viewing past events to be witnessed, (without giving the ability to affect the past, therefore creating no physical time paradoxes). 2) The device is working on known principles that are available to study and understand for the interested employees. 3) I work at PastWatch
Now, from 3) and 2) together, I deduce that I have access to the “technical stuff behind the functioning principles” of the device, and therefore I’d study them to the best of my abilities. From that knowledge, it would be possible to learn how to control the device in order to look for a specific historical event, in (past) time and space. At that point, I’d make a list of my favorite “miracles” (Note that I call “miracle” any phenomenon that wouldn’t happen according to the laws of physics, unless some “divine intervention” was there to produce it) as described in the available scriptures.
Now, if I were to witness the “parting/crossing of the Red Sea”, and I saw another version of the facts from what there is written in the scriptures, such as no “miracle” was involved, there are two possibilities:
a) the scriptures I used were wrong and they recorded an “exaggerated version” of the event, so that particular event wasn’t a miracle, therefore isn’t relevant for my search, and I should look for another b) the scriptures were right, and by some unknown effect, not in concordance with the known functioning of the device, the observation through PastWatch was altered, in such a way that the “miracle” wasn’t “there”.
Now, if b) is the case, then by definition the “altered observation” would be “divine intervention”, that is, a “miracle” in itself!
If a) were true, then I’d take my next favorite “miracle” and try to observe it. And if, by the same process, I get to the end of the list of miracles and never be able to witness any of them, then there would be these two possibilities: a’) all the scriptures are wrong and there was no “miracle”, ever, to begin with. b’) through “divine intervention” I was unable witness any miracles in past history.
Again, if b’) is true, then it (ironically) proves divine intervention by lack of it in all history. If a’) is true then the “negative result” means that I lost plenty of time to look for something that never existed, but at least I’ve exhausted all the options and found that all scriptures are wrong and/or exaggerating historical facts.
How would I know which one was really the case? I wouldn’t, as with all phenomena that are so disguised that we CAN’T know the truth about them, leaving the answer to the “faith” level, but it would help me decide what to believe on the matter of recorded “religion” and its reliability/authenticity, which would be worth the while spent at PastWatch.
You lose some, you win some.
A.
PS: if you are about to reply “Ha! So you admit you couldn’t tell!”, my answer would be : “In matters about which the others say that we are “prevented” to know by scientific methods the truth, my choice is on the side of skepticism, therefore I’d know there really is no such thing as “divine intervention”.
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posted
I really can't think of anything. I think my imagination's broke. Or my curiosity or something.
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I would want to recreate the lost library of Alexandria, and other lost historical works. So many works of the Greeks and others have been lost.
If it worked more recently, I would resurrect lost movie prints.
I second Carrie on Troy and ketchupqueen on the Roma.
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posted
Assuming the device allowed it, I'd like to view life on other planets in our galaxy, or other galaxies, particularly intelligent life.
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I think I'd initially be interested in researching all of history's most compelling mysteries: the identity of Jack the Ripper, what happened to Amelia Earhardt and Glenn Miller and Jimmy Hoffa, who killed the Black Dahlia, etc.
A lot of people mentioned following the life of Jesus. In particular, I'd be watching the tomb on Easter morning.
Then I'd go do that thing Seatarsprayan said about the girls I went to high school with.
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I would go and hunt down the original Hermes Trismegistus. Whoever he was, he was a genius.
And then I'd go and locate some mentally impaired medieval people and follow them around and make my dissertation the best ever.
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EL, I have often wished to have such a tool to help me with my history essays, especially when a lack of information is making it necessary for me to pull ideas out of almost nothing. I was especially longing for this when studying Ancient Egypt. All the questions and shifty extrapolations... replaced by factual information.
I'm not sure how you would source such a thing though (Bernard de Clairvaux, Clairvaux, France; June 15th, 1149, 11:15am time at the Greenwich Meridian). Also, I imagine that it would merely complicate things. Instead of having one or two pieces of evidence, you'd have hundreds, all slightly different.
However, even seeing five minutes of a historical scene could revolutionize the perceptions of that historical period.
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First, I'd take a survey of the 1960's, focusing on the US. Then the 70's, and the early 80's, maybe until 1984, the year of my birth. If I was allowed to interact with the world I would party very hard, but if I couldn't I would visit a lot of concerts.
Next would be ancient Greece, from Homer's time (or even before) to Alexander the Great. That would take a while.
Lastly, I would watch English history from the Restoration to about 1800. Actually, I'd probably continue into the lives of the Romantic poets from there.
I'm sure by the time I got done with those events I would have added more to the list.
Posts: 1364 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I would go watch the beginning(s) of agriculture to see how much was luck and how much was human cleverness. Then I would probably try to find every culture that managed to farm the same land for generations without ruining it, and see what principles I could learn from them. I'd also like to watch the development of the scythe in Europe, because it revolutionized agriculture at the time.
quote:The Reader, the question posed in the OP was what would you watch, not what would you change. Not everyone who worked at PastWatch got a chance to actually go back and do anything, that was kind of a big deal.
I had forgotten that part. Sorry.
Of course now I want to see more than just the founding of every major civilization. I would like to see the Exodus from Egypt and observe the pre-civilization humans and how they coped. I think it would be fascinating to watch Mankind figure out how to manipulate the world just as it realizes it can.
Originally posted by rivka:
quote:Hey, if Sam couldn't do it, what hope do I have?
As far as I know, that was the only large-scale thing he attempted. I haven't seen as much of Quantum Leap as I would like to, but from what I have seen (correct me if I show that I indeed know too little about QL), he could only influence relatively small historical events. Stopping the Kennedy assassination was just too big, which does bode ill for the rest of us after all.
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quote:Originally posted by Morbo: I would want to recreate the lost library of Alexandria, and other lost historical works. So many works of the Greeks and others have been lost.
I don't think it would be worth the effort. The information that was lost was advanced FOR IT'S TIME, but I'm sure it's all hopelessly obsolete by now. The tragedy of the loss is that we had to spend so many centuries recreating that knowledge, hence putting humanity back several hundred years.
We would be living like the Jetsons right now if that library had survived. (or we'd all be dead, you know... whichever)
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posted
sylvrdragon, you're correct that ancient science and to a lesser extent math is obsolete, but lost philosophy, history and literature works would still be very important.
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posted
Their math and science aren't wholly obsolete. The Pythagorean Theorem, the quadratic formula, etc, were all very important to modern day mathematics. Even calculus is rather old, considering how fast science goes forward. Most of the ancient scientific discoveries that are obsolete are those concerning astronomy (the Sun revolves around the Earth, all heavenly bodies are perfect, etc) or disease (leeches aren't the best treatment).
Posts: 1029 | Registered: Apr 2007
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quote:Originally posted by The Reader: Originally posted by rivka:
quote:Hey, if Sam couldn't do it, what hope do I have?
As far as I know, that was the only large-scale thing he attempted. I haven't seen as much of Quantum Leap as I would like to, but from what I have seen (correct me if I show that I indeed know too little about QL), he could only influence relatively small historical events. Stopping the Kennedy assassination was just too big, which does bode ill for the rest of us after all.
I recommend Netflixing them. All 5 seasons are on DVD.
I don't think it was the only major event. In fact, it could be argued that it was no more "big" than any of the other lives he saved. Anyway, he Leaped, so he had fulfilled his task for that Leap -- it just wasn't what he thought it was.
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quote:Originally posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer: or disease (leeches aren't the best treatment).
They actually are, for some things.
I knew someone would eventually say that. I am aware that leeches are still used for certain situations, but it is altogether an obsolete technique when you have medicines that are much better built to target the "bad blood" than are leeches.
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posted
It's not "still"; it's again. Leeches have been found to be MORE useful in some cases (like after reattaching amputated limbs) than any other treatment.
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quote:Originally posted by Morbo: sylvrdragon, you're correct that ancient science and to a lesser extent math is obsolete, but lost philosophy, history and literature works would still be very important.
History would be rather obsolete if we had a Pastwatch machine! As for philosophy, meh. Any idea that hasn't been rediscovered by now can't have been worth much. Literature could be interesting in an antiquarian sort of way, but I must say I'm prepared to live without it.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by The Reader: Originally posted by rivka:
quote:Hey, if Sam couldn't do it, what hope do I have?
As far as I know, that was the only large-scale thing he attempted. I haven't seen as much of Quantum Leap as I would like to, but from what I have seen (correct me if I show that I indeed know too little about QL), he could only influence relatively small historical events. Stopping the Kennedy assassination was just too big, which does bode ill for the rest of us after all.
I recommend Netflixing them. All 5 seasons are on DVD.
I don't think it was the only major event. In fact, it could be argued that it was no more "big" than any of the other lives he saved. Anyway, he Leaped, so he had fulfilled his task for that Leap -- it just wasn't what he thought it was.
And yet another reason for me to start using Netflix piles on. With this writers strike, I just might suscribe.
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